JDT paid big money to secure Diogo signing

The Malaysia Super League champions had to open up their sizeable coffers to entice Buriram United to part ways with Diogo Luis Santo.

It is not easy to get a top player these days but every player has his valuation and Johor Darul Ta'zim FC were able to satisfy what Buriram United wanted in sealing the deal with Brazilian Diogo Luis Santo.

The 31-year-old still had another left on his contract with the 2018 Thai League 1 champions when JDT came calling and it needed a big transfer fee to convince Buriram of letting go their prolific striker.

Goal understands that while neither Buriram nor JDT have released the official figure, the value of Diogo's transfer fee is thought to be approximately 5,000,000 baht (RM6.46 million). Which makes the former Olympiacos player the most expensive player signed by a Malaysian team.

In the 2017 and 2018 season, Diogo' services were also courted by other teams but all bids could not match the set transfer fee of USD2 million to USD2.5 million requested by Buriram. Just one year later but still in very good shape, JDT have somehow managed to negotiate to cut almost RM2 million off the fee.

From the Thai club's perspective, it still represents very good value to their financial side. And this is not the first case of them moving on players for high fees with Frank Acheampong sold to Anderlecht for 39 million baht and Javier Patino moving to Henan Jianye for 40 million baht in previous years.

This represent a huge investment on the part of JDT as they look to embark on their maiden journey into the exclusive AFC Champions League circles. In the competition this year, JDT are drawn in Group E with only Korean club Gyeongnam FC as the only known team in the group.

Two more teams from the playoffs will join JDT in Group E and given the match-ups, those are likely to be Chinese club Shandong Luneng and Japanese club, Kashima Antlers.